Historic window restoration advances Erie art center's growth

Wednesday

Residential condominiums may fill the top floor of the Performing Artists Collective Alliance.

Work is nearing completion on a $10,000 restoration project of an original beveled, leaded glass window that graced the facade of an Erie building on State Street built in 1899.

Erie artist John Vahanian restored the half-moon-shaped window, and a crew from Erie-based Schutte Woodworking built a new custom-made mahogany frame for it.

The window and frame, which weigh about 450 pounds, will be placed on the west facade of the Performing Artists Collective Alliance building, 1505 State St., in mid-July, PACA founder and Executive Director Mark Tanenbaum said.

PACA is a nonprofit theater and performing arts center that rents studio space to artists and other groups.

Tanenbaum, 61, an Erie native, said he wants the PACA building to look beautiful and offer the community "something unique that no one else does."

"We are looking at our position in the community and in the arts community, and we are here to serve," he said. "We want Erie to look nice, we want this redevelopment that's happening in our community and the rejuvenation of our community to be successful."

When Tanenbaum founded PACA in 2011, he unveiled an ambitious 10-year plan. His goals for the building's fourth floor include construction of an archery range, new studio and storage space, and additional rehearsal space.

Tanenbaum envisions building 14 condominiums on the fifth floor, each about 750 square feet, to be rented to artists already working in the building or to "anybody who wants to live downtown."

Some of the 31 tenants who lease space in the PACA building include First Amendment Tees, ClaySpace, Attic Rehab and PACA theater.

"We want to be partners where you see other people working hard, fixing up their buildings and making changes downtown and adding new opportunities for so many people," Tanenbaum said. "Whether it's in the technology field, the arts field, the business field, or entrepreneurial, everybody is working in the same direction. In my opinion, this is the first time in my lifetime that I'm seeing all of the oars in the water all pulling in the same direction. PACA wants to be a proud player."

Restoring the historic window is one of his latest projects.

The window consists of 13 panes, each divided with lead trim. It will be placed inside the new mahogany frame, hoisted by a lift and installed above the main entrance of First Amendment Tees Co. Inc. at 1507-1509 State St., on the west facade of the five-story, 70,000-square-foot PACA building.

"PACA is dedicated to the community," Tanenbaum said. "We want to do our very best for everyone, whether it's the art we produce on our stage, or the music and art shows that we bring in to the community, the spaces we make available to other artists, the programming we produce, or the fact that we're saving a 120-year-old building and making our entrance to the downtown more attractive."

The window, called a sunburst design because it resembles a setting or rising sun, is 12 feet long and 26 inches at its crown.

The window sat in a fourth-floor storage room for decades before Tanenbaum discovered it two years ago, shortly after the nonprofit bought the PACA building in late 2016 for about $230,000.

"I believe they took it out in the 1940s, and it was just stored and forgotten," Tanenbaum said. "Two years ago, when we started doing the cleanout, we found it, and it was screwed to a board and sandwiched between these two boards because they wanted it protected. I saw the end sticking out and I said, 'What the hell is this?' I was told it is the front window. When they took this window out originally, they saved it, thank God. They could have thrown it away."

One broken pane of lead glass was replaced. Additional restoration work included replacing all of the lead framing and re-welding all of the metal strut supports, Tanenbaum said.

The original oak frame was rotted, necessitating construction of a new frame that measures about 13 feet by 3 feet.

Crews from Schutte Woodworking LLC built the Sapele mahogany frame, which weighs about 100 pounds.

"The type of mahogany we used is very economical and it's naturally rot resistant," Schutte Woodworking owner Steve Rimpa said.

PACA officials initially thought about painting the frame white.

"I think it was a wise choice going to mahogany and the fact that we went with clear varnish instead of painting it white," Rimpa said. "Initially it was going to be white, but as the project kept going along, I sent Mark some test pictures of the frame and he thought the mahogany was gorgeous and he said, 'No way are we painting it white.' ''

The next phase of work on the historic window involves setting it in the frame, sealing it, carrying it down four floors of stairs and installing it.

Crews from Penn Glass and Schutte Woodworking will affix the window on the PACA building.

In April, another project involving installation of 36 new double-pane, historically accurate windows on the PACA building's west facade was completed as part of a $117,000 facade improvement project. The project began in 2017.

"The design on them needed to be approved by the Pennsylvania Historic and Museum Commission, and they were," Tanenbaum said. "We are actively getting our building on the National Historic Register, and we should have that done within six months."

The project was funded by a $45,000 grant from the Erie Redevelopment Authority, $25,000 from the Erie Community Foundation and $47,000 raised by PACA.

"You can tilt them out, you can wash them, and they're really easy to clean," Tanenbaum said. "When this building was built in 1899, they built all the windows on the building's premises. Every single one is slightly different, so it was hard to replace them, but our crews measured everything and just did an incredible job. Because these windows are 4 feet 6 inches (wide), nothing was standard, so everything cost more. Every window is within an inch or two of each other, but an inch or two makes them unique."

Ron Leonardi can be reached at 870-1680 or by e-mail. Follow him on Twitter at www.Twitter.com/ETNLeonardi.

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